2024]

Ministerial Statement- Israel and Gaza update [26/03/2024]

Greenock Telegraph [26/03/2024]

STATEMENT: PHSO women’s state pension age report work [25/03/2024]

Westminster diary wb 18th March 2024

Monday

Down the road early and on arrival I had a series of Teams meetings. Most notably I met representatives of the Bank of Scotland along with Stuart McMillan MSP. Unfortunately, the main subject of discussion was the impending closure of their branch in Port Glasgow. High street banking, along with the demand for cash has been reducing for years and it’s almost inevitable that we are seeing more closures. I say almost because there are alternatives. Banking hubs have been successful in a number of places and of course many a town has cash machines even if they don’t have a branch. And the Post Office have stepped in on many an occasion to handle transactions which traditionally were more associated with banks. I shall be talking to Link about the options available and hopefully we can provide a better outcome. In the evening I had four votes on the shameful Rwanda Bill. The U.K. government win them all and the bill now moves to the House of Lords. I don’t expect we will get to see it again until after Easter recess. The Conservative and Unionist government has more pressing things to concern itself with than running the U.K. They have internal party strife to deal with.

Tuesday

Today, I started by meeting with the Post Office. And not surprisingly I questioned them about access to cash. They are familiar with the issues with Post Office services in Inverclyde and we discussed, not just Port Glasgow but Kilmacolm as well. The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Drug Policy Reform had its Annual General Meeting and then I caught up with the People’s Post Code Lottery. They have concerns over the new levy on the gambling industry as they exist to fund good causes rather than pay huge salaries and they don’t target vulnerable gamblers. It was a sensible conversation and there is definitely room for a smarter levy. I met with National Energy Action to discuss projects to retrofit houses to make them easier to heat.

Wednesday

I dropped into the Marie Curie Great Daffodil Appeal and then went to Millbank to appear on the Nicky Campbell show on BBC five live. Along with Anthony Mangnall MP, Conservative, and Emily Thornberry MP, Labour, we discussed the Rwanda Bill, dodgy donors to the Conservative Party, the Labour Party endorsing Thatcherism and to my great delight, Nicky gave a shout out to my show on Clyde Coast Radio. He even did a jingle for me.

Thursday

I had a catch-up meeting with council officials to discuss the Long Terms Planning for Towns Scheme. Inverclyde has been awarded £20 million and we are in the process of putting together a town board. This will be people who represent different aspects of our society and will be managed by a yet to be identified chair. The U.K. government place quite stringent rules on this process and we need to ensure we tick the boxes to qualify for the money. I attended the fabulous music gala in the town hall and was entertained by the musical product from the Inverclyde Musical Service. This service enables and encourages the musical talent of Inverclyde’s youth. And many go onto further study and then feedback into the service.

Friday

I met with officials from the U.K. government to discuss the Long Terms Planning for Towns Scheme. They were on a whistle stop tour of three towns in Scotland and we got very little notice of the visit, but we made the best of it. Hopefully, we can make a success of this funding as part of the regeneration of Greenock. I had surgeries at the Craigend Resource Centre in the afternoon.

Greenock Telegraph 22nd March

Finally Labour has listened to the people of Inverclyde – and the SNP – and agreed to the Scottish government’s fully funded Council Tax freeze.

A sizeable part of my job is the time and effort spent trying to facilitate improvements in Inverclyde. Most recently Inverclyde has been awarded £19 million pounds in levelling up funding and £20 million pounds as part of the long-term plans for towns programme.

That money, along with the £2 million from Sustrans for the town centre refurbishment, will go a long way to making a positive difference. Such money always comes with a very specific remit and we need to be clear about how it will be spent before we are successful in our applications. The frustration is that while I try to make Inverclyde more attractive, any council tax increase will make it less appealing to live in. People can stay in Skelmorlie or Bishopton and pay less than they would if they live in Inverclyde under the Labour plan to hike bills needlessly. That’s not just council tax we miss out on, it’s money spent in the local community. While we already have a declining population a council tax increase would have been a retrograde step. The council tax rise is not needed because from the outset the offer was on the table from the Scottish Government to cover the cost of the rise with no cuts to frontline services. Finally, Labour has agreed with the SNP that the people of Inverclyde deserved much better than their 8.2 per cent hike. Labour has u-turned and spectacularly so.

Whatever way the Labour councillors chose to spin it, the fact is that Inverclyde would have lost out on £2.9 million of inward investment this year alone. That was completely unacceptable. That money would have come to Inverclyde under the SNP councillor’s budget which also protected jobs and services. Instead, the people of Inverclyde were being asked by Labour to foot the bill of Labour’s vanity.

And we were put through a needless fiasco of showboating from Labour councillors.

A rise that was mocked on social media by Labour councillors as being practically nothing, amounts to a lot for people already struggling after years of Conservative and Unionist austerity. Through all the smoke and mirrors, and the deflection and distractions, the one thing Labour – and its supporters – could not answer was why Inverclyde could afford to reject £2.9 million of inward investment and instead add this to the bills of hard-pressed households,

Had this ruinous hike gone through Inverclyde would have been a laughing stock. It looks like we have come back from the brink. I hope Labour has learned that politics is actually about doling what’s best for communities, not about what will get you publicity, however embarrassing that publicity turns out to be.

It didn’t need to be this way.

PHSO Report – Women’s State Pension age (WASPI) [21/03/2024]

Earlier today, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman issued it’s report and findings into Women’s State Pension age.

The WASPI women have been very badly let down and many will have died while waiting for the compensation they deserve.

This matter should be a priority for the UK government and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman report today provides all the information required for a speedy conclusion. The only question now is how much compensation will be paid.

This denial of justice for the women is disgraceful and has been allowed to go on for far too long. The PHSO report is rightly scathing in its criticism of the Department of Work and Pensions.

After all this time the UK government must pay compensation to the WASPI women and pay it promptly. The ball is in its court.

The unjustified state pension changes have saved the UK government £181 billion. The former Tory Chancellor George Osborne described the changes in state pension entitlement as the ‘easiest savings’ he had ever made.

If the UK Government were to pay ten thousand pounds compensation to the WASPI women would still net a saving of £145 billion pounds to the UK Exchequer.

The UK government must acknowledge the conclusions of this report, the DWP must apologise and compensation should be forthcoming immediately.

The current Ombudsman, Rob Behrens, is leaving his post and I would imagine his successor would want this matter off the books before they start.

One way or another we need to see immediate action on this to compensate women in Inverclyde. I will continue to support the WASPI campaigners in my role as your local Member of Parliament.

Yours sincerely,